LONDON, Aug 16 (Reuters) - European shares recovered after Beijing said it would hold trade talks with the U.S. this month, spurring a risk appetite recovery, although Italian shares fell sharply as Atlantia sank.

Europe's STOXX 600 rose 0.2 percent by 0840 GMT on Thursday, clawing back some of Wednesday's losses which had taken it to a six-week low as emerging markets entered bear territory.

Italy's government said it plans to strip the group's Autostrade unit of its motorway concession and seek heavy fines following the deadly collapse of a motorway bridge in Genoa.

Atlantia said shareholders and bondholders could be hurt and the stock had its biggest fall ever when it opened after a 50-minute delay.

The Italian market was closed on Wednesday so was also catching up with the previous session's falls and political news.

"The market is quite resilient today given the falls we had yesterday with the equity market closed, and quite violent moves in bond markets," said Rory McPherson, investment director at Psigma Investment Management.

"The fear is that the Italian coalition put forward a fiscal programme that's looser than the European Commission would like and dig their heels in, which is what Conte has threatened to do."

Overall, mining stocks were the top gainers, rising 1.2 percent after suffering their worst day since the Brexit vote on Wednesday when metals prices sank.

Investors were calculating the magnitude of the risk from Turkey and a broader emerging markets crisis.

Shares in Dutch marine and engineering company Boskalis fell 7 percent after it reported first-half earnings that missed estimates due to loss-making transport activities at its offshore energy division.

French outdoor advertising firm JCDecaux rose 6.8 percent thanks to analysts at Berenberg upgrading the stock to "buy", saying they thought Google's possible entry into the outdoor ad market in Europe could be good news.

German pharmaceuticals group Bayer lost another 5.3 percent, the top DAX faller, taking losses this week to more than 17 percent after a ruling against subsidiary Monsanto over alleged links between a weedkiller and cancer.

The fresh blow to the stock came from a report in WirtschaftsWoche saying farmers in Arkansas and South Dakota have filed class action lawsuits against Monsanto.